


Down the Youtube Rabbit Hole

by stifledlaughter



Series: ReSWAN ficlets [1]
Category: Johnny the Homicidal Maniac
Genre: Gen, M/M, ReSWAN, Swanish, YouTube
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-30
Updated: 2017-04-30
Packaged: 2018-10-25 14:11:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,913
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10765863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stifledlaughter/pseuds/stifledlaughter
Summary: "The day they discovered Youtube, it was a game changer."Tenna finds horror and gore makeup videos, Jimmy finds cryptid shows, and Edgar realizes something about himself from cooking shows, of all things, and shares this with Nny.[Based off of Lady Yate-xel's "Song without a Name" series]





	Down the Youtube Rabbit Hole

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Song Without a Name (Reprise)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2057940) by [LadyYateXel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyYateXel/pseuds/LadyYateXel). 



> It's me again, writing a fanfic for a fanfic! If you have not read Song without a Name [Reprise], then you probably should before reading this, but, eh, you can also wing it. You do you.

The day they discovered Youtube, it was a game changer.

Edgar had know of it from TV and the news, but not of the breadth and scope that it had become in the years since its inception. Millions of videos, thousands of different topics, and all for free at their fingertips (most things were for them but Edgar still had residual guilt sometimes for not paying for things.) 

It wasn't until Jimmy had been sent a few videos through the blog to look at that they all quickly fell down the rabbit hole, and fast. Once Dib had "donated" (with stipulation) another tablet, there was plenty of media to go around, and they ran with it. 

It started with Tenna voraciously consuming makeup videos, dragging Edgar over excitedly going "THEY HAVE ZOMBIE MAKEUP. LOOK AT THIS. OH GOD" and excitedly poring over the videos, following along with makeup stolen from the local Sephora at the mall, and whatever else she could convince Jimmy to grab from the Michael's nearby. 

"Look at how she does this," said Tenna, pointing at the woman applying paint on top of drying gelatin. "It looks just like an open wound!" 

As she watched more of the videos and became more comfortable with practicing alongside the makeup vloggers, Edgar became the victim of many experiments. Shredded skin, dripping blood, exposed teeth (which became harder with his beard, and adamantly refused to shave it despite Tenna's please) - he became the canvas for their future shows.  

They were sitting in his living room, a sheet thrown on the ground to protect the floor as Tenna followed along with the video instructing her on how to turn someone into a bloody mess. 

Edgar was, at that moment, glad that Nny was working on fixing the outfits for the show with Devi at her place. These wounds did look entirely too realistic, to the point where he wasn't even sure if he felt comfortable with them on him. But Tenna was extremely excited, and hopped up and down from her kneeling position. "Ohhhh man can I get Jimmy to grab some of this gelatin stuff for me next time? Oh, werewolf nail video!" 

"Let's stick to the wound stuff for now," said Edgar, looking at the long sharp nails in the video on the sidebar of the one they were watching. 

"Why not? You've got the beard for it. And maybe Nny is just as into danger as you are," she said casually, searching for the right paintbrush in the pile she had. 

Edgar reddened and stammered, "It's not like-"

"Hm, I need some more of the orange paint..." Keeping her eyes on Edgar, she flailed her hand around until it hit the bottle she needed. "A-ha!" She started to paint the "wounds" on his arm, humming cheerfully. Her song thrummed in the air as the video played in the background of Jimmy's tablet. 

"Do you kind of wish you could do videos like this?" Edgar asked. "You know, for people to watch?" 

She frowned, and her painting slowed. "I... yeah. I think I'd want to. It's kind of like performing with you all, I guess, but if I screw up, I can fix it with video editing. If I ever learned that."

Edgar smiled. "I bet there's a channel for that too."

She started to mix paints on the back of her hand. "I think I'd like that." 

There was the noise of a door slamming, along with the sound of someone kicking off their shoes. Jimmy came into the room, a bag hefted over his shoulder. "The modeling wax was a bitch to find but I got a few of those, and also a crapload of spearmint gum... because that was on the list?" 

Tenna squealed and jumped up, flecks of paint flying. "Ahh! You found the modeling wax!" She threw her arms around Jimmy, who blushed and shrugged the shoulder off of his shoulder, presenting it to her. 

"Um, yeah... took a bit but you circled it like four times so I figured it was really important." He took a step back to look at Edgar so far. "Holy shit. Looks like you got into a fistfight with a Yowie."

"Watching that cryptid show again with Nny?" asked Tenna as she eagerly dug through the bag. "Ahhh that's the stuff." She pulled out the jar of modeling wax. "Edgar we can do the werewolf bites now!" 

"Yeah, the German lessons bore him." Jimmy settled into the sofa, watching them from above. "He still fixing the costumes with Devi?"

Edgar nodded, careful not to shake his arm. "Yeah."

Jimmy propped his chin up on his hands. "There any food here?" 

"Yeah, I made bibimbap yesterday," said Edgar thoughtlessly as he stared, mesmerized, by the gore blossoming out of his skin. Tenna had started to apply the modeling wax here and there, pleased by her results. 

"You made what?" Jimmy asked, brows furrowing. 

"It's a Korean thing," said Edgar. "I saw it on this channel."

What he didn't say is that he had been watching the channel for about two weeks now just to hear the nice, fun Korean mom talk and guide people through the recipes. Or imagine himself in the kitchen, handing her stuff and laughing with her. 

He can only imagine the teasing he'd get. 

Sometimes Edgar was struck by the absence of parents. He felt that in another world, the other times he had lived, he had had parents. Maybe they fought sometimes, but overall, they were there for him. Maybe it was the dad who cooked and the mom that threw him baseballs, or two moms or two dads or just one parent, but somehow, in another world, he had had a guide or two. And in this, he only had what he saw and fumbled to follow.

So when he found Maangchi's cooking channel, he was drawn in by the cheery, warm smile and mother-like aura she had. He watched her videos, and then one day, decided to make something. He started to write down a list of what he could try to substitute from what he had (Kimchi? Basically sour cabbage, right?), but when he opened some boxes downstairs in the basement to check what he had, they were full of bags with Korean writing on them, neatly packaged, as if they were directly shipped there. He didn't even know exactly what he needed, but the house had. 

He decided to go with the bibimbap, as that video had the most views. Again, everything he needed materialized, and he fumbled with the bags and squinted at the measurements on the cups. sometimes he would pause the video, other times just let it loop as the food cooked.

As he settled down to eat it, he switched to another channel, a blogger, Olan Rogers, that told funny life stories about apartment neighbors and childhood friends that ended up becoming bank robbers, as if a friend sat across the table sharing dinner with him. Sometimes, he thought that maybe this guy could be a friendly older brother. 

He knew it was odd. He knew that, with his reputation as The TV Guy, it probably made it worse that he attached himself to people on a computer screen that spoke so personally but were really speaking to thousands of strangers. 

Sometimes the TV people felt far away, but these people here, looking into the camera, asking questions, pausing for you, didn't feel so far away, and Edgar took comfort in it. 

But he said nothing of all of this as he got the Tupperware of bibimbap leftovers out of the fridge, which Jimmy eagerly dug into.

"You're not even going to heat it up?" asked Tenna suspiciously. "You've got access to a microwave and you're just... ignoring it?"

"Itsh still good cowld," said Jimmy though a mouthful of rice.

"Ew."

Jimmy swallowed and said, "Did you get all of the food stuff from the house?" 

"I gotta say, it creeps me out sometimes," said Tenna, who back to happily making awful, garish wounds on one of her closest friends. "Like, it knows your thoughts?"

"Don't question the house that feeds you," said Jimmy, and Tenna snorted. 

Edgar looked around. He questioned some things, but the house had kept him alive for years. He felt that he had no choice but to trust it. 

Which... wasn't a choice then at all. 

\-----------------------------------

 

Nny and Edgar were curled up on the couch, Jimmy's tablet settled between them as they were watching an episode about Sewer People cryptids in huge cities where the underground plumbing systems apparently housed massive quantities of fish people. 

"There are half likes and have dislikes on this one," said Nny, squinting at the screen. "Guess we have 50% nonbelievers."

"It's a weird world but sometimes you have to say enough is enough," said Edgar, shrugging. 

"This coming from someone who is reincarnated?" 

Edgar laughed. "Alright,  fine, you win this one."

After that episode was finished, Nny started to click around. "You said you watched this one episode with Jimmy- was it the Yowie?... Wait, what's this?"

Edgar felt suddenly very awkward, like he had to hide something as Nny clicked on a Maangchi video, one of the ones he had watched repeatedly because she talked about her family in it, and imagined himself maybe being a part of that. (He privately thought he would be an excellent cooking assistant but would never share that with anyone ever.)

"You've been cooking Korean or something?" Nny asked, and Edgar almost felt it would be lying to say it was only that. 

"Well, yeah, but also..."

Nny furrowed his eyebrows. "It's not... a... like, you know..."

Edgar waved his hands, furiously blushing. "No no! It's..." Well, this made it far easier, now that something even worse had come up as a possibility. "Like, you know that none of us had parents, I didn't have any parents, but sometimes, I wish I did, right? So I sometimes just imagine what it's like to have this mom, like, if she could have been my mom."

Nny stared at Edgar, who was expecting laughter, but instead, Nny reached out and put his hand on Edgar's arm. "Why did you think you had to hide that from me?" 

"I wasn't hiding it, I just... felt it was weird to mention. I don't think anyone else in the group feels this weird draw to have parents, you know? Like, did you ever want to have parents?"

Nny scrunched his nose, which Edgar refrained from touching even though he found it incredibly adorable. "No. They seem limiting. Curfews and stuff, right?" 

Edgar held out his hands in the universal "see?" gesture. "Exactly. I'm the only one that has this weird draw to have parents."

Nny laughed. "That's fine. I have a murderers inside me. We all have our quirks."

"So we can joke about it then?" It made Edgar uncomfortable to think about the murderers within his boyfriend, but as this was not something he could Google help for, he generally tried his best to ignore the fear and focus on the Nny that was in front of him. 

Nny smiled sadly. "What else do I do?"

Edgar leaned forward and tapped to play the Maangchi video. "Let's just... look at this for a bit."

Close and warm, they stayed together as the video played, and then looped to other videos, until they both fell asleep. 


End file.
